Declarations For October 2021
Pray with me…..
My Father in Heaven, this can only be your doing to see me safely through to theTenth month of this year. Ten (10) is a number of completion so I know that you are making everything in my life WHOLE, FULL and RESTORED in this month of October. I decree and declare that;
- You have brought everything that you have started in my life to completion in Jesus’ name.
You have restored to me the joy of Your salvation, and upheld me with a willing spirit. - As You who have allowed me to see many troubles and calamities, so also have You revived me again; from the depths of the earth You have brought me up again.
- You are increasing my greatness and comforting me again.
- Because I have been born of God, I have overcome the world and any challenge that it has presented thus far.
- My God of all grace, who has called me to His eternal glory in Christ, will Himself restore, confirm, strengthen, and establish me.
- Just as You O Lord restored the fortunes of Job, You will give me twice as much as I had before.
- Instead of my shame you are giving me a double portion.
- Instead of dishonor I will rejoice in my lot.
- You are bestowing on me a crown of beauty instead of ashes,
- You are giving me the oil of joy instead of mourning and a garment of praise instead of a spirit of despair.
- I am called an oak of righteousness, a planting of the Lord for the display of His splendor.
- I will possess a double portion in this land and have everlasting joy.
- You have restored health to me O Lord, my wounds you have healed forever.
- You are restoring to me the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the hopper, the destroyer, and the cutter.
- I shall eat in plenty and be satisfied, and praise the name of the Lord my God, who has dealt wondrously with me.
- Never again will I be put to shame.
We declare that it is so and so it is in the mighty name of Jesus Christ we pray! AMEN!
XOXO
Lady Abena.
Dear Unbeliever - The Bible Is The Word of God
Dear Unbeliever,
Welcome to part 3 of my letter. If you haven’t read the first 2 parts, I encourage you to do so by clicking on the previous weeks’ blogs to read before you proceed with this one. Today we are discussing the reality of the Bible being the true word of God. I know most non-believing people think us believing Christians are crazy to think God actually wrote the bible or even believe in its potency. I remember a rapper making fun as to why there are so many versions of this one book - suggesting that maybe we are confused as Christians but think the secular world is the one confused instead.
If you do a google search on this topic, you will find so many articles - some defending the Bible as the true word of God and others opposing it. Thus, I’ll spare you another argument or reproduce what others have already said. One article I found so helpful was written by Dr. Adrian Rogers of Love Worth Finding Ministries for Christianity.com and I think you should read it as well. The title of his article is “Is the Bible Really the Word of God?” It is so insightful and spot on and confirms the viability of the Bible. For now, I’d like to share my own experience on this topic for you.
I started reading the bible quite early, from my Sunday school days. Do you know that as I grew older, I only remembered the interesting stories that were shared in Sunday school? I was once in a debate and ‘sword drill’, oh you’d love it. It was a competition for various Sunday Schools. We’d come together and see who was well versed in the bible and could open to a quoted scripture first. My surprise is how I seemed to easily forget the scriptures as I grew older. As an adult, when I started having encounters with the Lord, I thought it would be nice to read the bible from Genesis to Revelation so I embarked on the journey. Do you know that I got frustrated not long after I started reading it? I couldn't seem to retain the scriptures and be able to quote them as others did. Yes - most believers memorize scriptures and actually take pride in quoting them. Oh trust me, they can make other believers feel like they know nothing. I used to equate their ability in quoting scriptures to a high-level spirituality. Boy was I wrong. Yes I was and if you ever encounter one of those kinds of believers, don’t let them scare you away. Proximity to the word of God is not proof that they truly know God. If you see a believer who knows every scripture but has not been transformed by it, then your guess is as good as mine so you have nothing to worry about.
You see, the bible on its own is a compendium of words and reading it from your human mind and intellect can be confusing. Some of the stories make you squirm, others give you hope. I wasn’t retaining anything I was reading because I was doing it from a human perspective. God is a spirit, so if I was going to read his book, reading it from a fleshy mindset wasn’t going to cut it for me. When I received the Baptism of the Holy Spirit and He started to manifest in my life, I suddenly started to read the bible with a different meaning and understanding. It was as if someone was explaining to me everything I read and I was getting tons of revelations from what I read. I found 3 things as I read the Bible: Promises, Prophecies and Principles to live by. The stories stuck with me and through each chapter, I’d find so much gold I have become addicted to reading it daily.
I love the different versions because they expand the words as well as make it more understandable to the modern reader. My newest obsession is with the Complete Jewish Bible (CJB) which gives you a raw translation of the bible from Hebrew to English. I’m also on the YouVersion Bible App and oh how I have been blessed by it. I can sort through different versions with just a scroll of the finger. YouVersion also has tons of daily devotionals which speak to every aspect of your life or things that are boggling your mind. In just the last year and half, I have completed over 150 devotionals and I hope I can make it to 200 completed devotionals before the end of this year. Another time I will share who and what sparked my fire to study these devotionals. All you need to know is that it has blessed me and now I can’t stop.
I went to bed one night wondering if God will ever avenge me on a situation I had been wrongly dealt in. I usually don’t keep my bible open in the night for fear that I might roll over it and tear a page. I woke up that morning to find my bible open to a chapter in Genesis. I was a bit confused because my last reading in the night time was Paul’s letters to the Corinthians. Even if I wanted to flip it to Genesis, the bible would have closed entirely because it’s a heavy one. I curiously read the chapter and lo and behold, it was addressing my very concern and how God avenged the person. Immediately I knew that the Holy Spirit had opened that scripture for me to read. Since then, I didn’t underestimate the power of God’s word anymore. He truly is everywhere, sees everything and hears every conversation and prayer. The ones we speak out and the ones we speak only in our minds and heart. This has been my true encounter with the word of God and I cannot doubt it again. I am currently studying Robert M’Cheyne’s One Year Bible Reading Plan on day 268 out of 365 days. I encourage you to satisfy your doubts and curiosity by reading it too. I pray that the Holy Spirit will bring the bible to life for you. Maybe, and just maybe, you’ll have a different perspective on the genuineness of the Bible.
May the Lord bless you and keep you this week. We will continue our discussions on Oct 10, 2021 because at the beginning of each month, I like to make some declarations over the month and I hope you’ll join me on that as well. If you’ve been reading this series thus far, I’d like to think we have some kind of friendship going on here? It doesn’t matter or bother me if you believe in my God or not, I still love and accept you as Jesus Christ has commanded.
To be continued…
XOXO,
Lady Abena.
Dear Unbeliever - Yes God Exists!
Dear Unbeliever,
Welcome to part 2 of my letter which I started to write to you last week. If you haven’t read the first part, please click on this link https://abenabondah.com/2021/09/12/dear-unbeliever/ to read before you proceed with this one. Our chat today is centered on the fact that you wonder why we (Believing Christians) serve a man whom we have never met called God. Does He even exist or someone has just managed to convince millions of people that God exists? More so, we try to get you (Unbelievers) to believe that God truly exists.
Well, since we are being transparent here, let me assure you that there were times in my life, a lot of times that I wondered the same. It was usually during times when things were going so wrongly for me and I felt lost no matter what I tried. It was during times when I saw chaos around the world, when evil seemed to be thriving and winning and innocent and good people were paying the price for things they had no business with. BUT - I didn’t seem to wonder about His existence when all was rosy and dandy with me. Isn't this interesting? We equate good things to God and when the negative stuff occurs we begin to doubt if He is real.
A few times I did put in the google search “Does God exist” and I can tell you the many articles, opinions etc. that came up was enough to give you a tension headache. From scientific research to theological arguments and all. After my confusion reading several of these debates and even scholarly articles trying to disprove the existence of God, I looked up to the skies and let my mind wander off for a moment. I looked at the sun, studied the moon and stars in the night, I looked at the living creatures - the squirrels sneaking around my backyard and all. I even looked at the ants and their ways. I looked at the flowers in bloom and the trees in the fall. Then I experienced motherhood - conception, the pregnancy journey and the birthing of my son who is also my heartbeat. Long story short, I just paid attention to all these things and more and I told myself - who made it all possible? Someone must have created these or created laws and systems for these things to happen through us humans. Who told the seas to never cross its shoreline and the skies to never fall on us? I hope you understand that I can go on for another 10+ pages listing everything that makes you and I realize that there’s an owner to all these things.
So, even if you still doubt, how do you presume you showed up here on earth? Who configured you to be able to think, breathe, speak etc.? Watch the way you fall asleep - quite easily don’t you? Now, do you see what happens in your life when you’re asleep? Obviously not. My folks have a saying that “if you do not know what death feels like, study how you sleep.” Isn’t that the honest truth? Who wakes you up when it’s time for your body to be up and how come some people go to sleep and they never wake up? The bible says in John 1:18 that no man has seen God and rightly so. This was the perception for a very long time. The Israelites if you read about their journey in the bible, saw some aspects of God and His nature. I mean they even heard the voice of God like thunder. God showed Himself to them like a pillar of cloud that they could actually see His presence. He did so many miracles - I’m not talking about invisible things - I mean real tangible things like manna falling from the sky and parting the sea right before their eyes. Do you know that even them, at every turn doubted God and were disobedient and unfaithful to Him? Sometimes in our humanness we find it inconceivable that these things the bible talks about are real but they are.
In my pursuit to know God, I started to read the scriptures which reveal the nature of God, who He is and what He says. Through the scriptures, I learned the names of God which also revealed the different dimensions of who He is. Every time the Israelites (the people whom God called to be His own), saw a dimension of Him, they gave him a name. For instance, in Genesis 22:14, we are introduced to why we call God El-Jireh, ‘The Provider’. “So Abraham called that place The LORD Will Provide. And to this day it is said, “On the mountain of the LORD it will be provided.” I also looked at the life of Jesus Christ - the son of God. Yes, I believe Him with all my heart that God sent Him into this world to give us a physical appearance of who He is. Jesus Christ is God in flesh. His coming to the earth a human being was to correct our perception of who God is. Until He came, people thought God was just an angry old man with so many rules that no one can abide by. Jesus came to show us that NO - God is love and He loves us more than we can ever love Him.
Finally, I came to know the existence of God through my own personal experiences. A lot of situations and circumstances happened in my life that the resolutions were only something divinely orchestrated. Which means humanly some of the things I got out of unscathed were not possible. A power greater than me or human power intervened and that’s how I knew that God really exists. I’ve had several encounters and listened to the stories of many people who have had several encounters as well. Even the ones who did not believe that God exists believed that there was a higher force or power at play in their situations, a.ka. God. God exists - He does and I challenge you to at least start reading the bible to find out for yourself. I also pray fervently that He will give you an encounter through which you will come to see Him, His mighty power and everlasting love towards you. As you go through this week, may the Lord bless you and answer any questions about Him that’s boggling your mind.
To be continued next week as God wills....
XOXO,
Lady Abena.